Country music from a fan's point of view since 2008
Wynonna released her only solo live album to date, Her Story: Scenes From a Lifetime, in September 2005. The project was recorded live at the Grand Ole Opry House that winter. The concert traced her musical journey as one half of The Judds to her solo career and beyond.
It’s easy to view Her Story: Scenes From A Lifetime as just another live album, with little stylistic reinterpretation and little new to offer the longtime listener. But to cast it aside is to miss Wynonna at her most confident and self-assured, digging into her vocal prowess like never before. The double album is a rich tapestry perfectly encapsulating her personality through song and story.
Wynonna opened with a gorgeous rendition of “Dream Chaser,” a brilliant album cut that should’ve been a Judds single. She uses her refined grit to full effect on the plucky “Girls Night Out” and adds some bluesy charm to “Love Is Alive.” Wynonna reflects on the Mayberry-esque nature of Judds music before “Young Love” and Carl Perkins’ electric contributions to “Let Me Tell You About Love.”
For her solo music, Wynonna thanked the crowd for helping “She Is His Only Need” hit #1. She remarked on the acts (Garth Brooks, Tim McGraw, Billy Dean, etc) that were opening for her as “Tell Me Why” was climbing the charts. A quick story about changing diapers on the tour bus proved a poignant into to “To Be Loved By You.” There wasn’t a story, but she did elevate “No One Else on Earth” to full-fledged arena rock.
My favorite of her solo-revisions is “That Was Yesterday,” a song I’m embarrassed to say I hadn’t heard before. Wynonna told the audience of a fan who finally had the courage to leave her abusive husband and as an explanation left that song playing as a loop in the CD player. It’s my favorite vocal on the whole album, a reminder of why Wynonna is one of the greatest singers country music has ever produced. Her control is spellbinding.
Wynonna took liberties with the remainder of the set list. She performed many choice album cuts and a few cover songs. A few of the tunes, “Sometimes I Feel Like Elvis,” “Burnin’ Love” and “I Want to Know What Love Is” came from her What The World Needs Now Is Love album. She reprised “Don’t You Through That Mojo On Me” from The Other Side along with a quick anecdote about Ray Benson’s role in introducing her to the blues (along with giving her, her stage name).
The covers were, not surprisingly, excellent. Wynonna’s tone lends perfectly to Melissa Etheridge’s “I’m The Only One” and Tina Turner’s “The Best.” Just as good is “Help Me,” the Joni Mitchell classic she originally recorded on New Day Dawning.
It wouldn’t be a Wynonna album without a spiritual bent. She becomes her most personal, talking about the father she never met, when introducing “I Can Only Imagine.” I used this recording in college for a presentation on spirituality. She also included “When I Reach The Place I’m Going” (From Wynonna) and “Peace In This House.”
After listening to Her Story, you feel like you know Wynonna just a little bit more. The conversational style she brought to this album brilliantly sets it apart from those cash-grabbing live projects most singers release throughout their careers. This is a full concert and is treated as such. What that in mind it does become cumbersome to listen to the tracks individually and hear the talking before the music. But that’s a small price to pay for the magical night she’s committed to tape. This is the shining example of Wynonna the singer, warts and all.
Grade: A
Released in February 1995, Trisha Yearwood’s follow-up to the platinum-selling The Song Remembers When is in some respect a back-to-basics project. Like its predecessor, Thinkin’ About You is highly polished, though not overproduced, and allows Yearwood to kick up her heels just a bit more than the ballad-heavy Song Remembers When.
Garth Fundis once again assumes production duties, with Harry Stinson acting as co-producer on the album’s advance single, “XXX’s and OOO’s (An American Girl).” Written by Matraca Berg and Alice Randall, “XXX’s and OOO’s” became Trisha’s second #1 hit, and her first since her debut single “She’s In Love With the Boy” nearly four years earlier. MCA had stopped promoting The Song Remembers When after sending only two singles to radio. “XXX’s and OOO’s” raced up the charts more quickly than anyone expected, leaving the label with somewhat of a dilemma when there was no album ready to cash in on the single’s success. Five months after “XXX’s and OOO’s” reached the top spot in Billboard, an album was finally released. Fortunately, the delay did not result in any loss of sales momentum, thanks to the success of the title track, which was released as the album’s second single. It also reached #1.
The next single, a cover of Melissa Etheridge’s “You Can Sleep While I Drive” didn’t fare as well on the charts, stalling at #23. It’s somewhat similar to Trisha’s earlier hit “Walkaway Joe”, and perhaps for that reason it didn’t have a lot of traction at radio. Or perhaps there were too many other ballads on the charts at the time; at any rate, it is one of the album’s highlights, beautifully sung and tastefully produced, and it deserved more attention than it received.
Trisha returned to the Top 10 with “I Wanna Go Too Far” which reached #9. This is one of those songs that is forgotten as soon as it falls off the charts; I didn’t even remember that it had been a single until I started preparing for this review. The album’s fourth and final single, a cover of Gretchen Peters’ “On A Bus To St. Cloud” died at #59, becoming the first Trisha Yearwood single to peak outside the Top 40. A critical favorite, it is a well-crafted record that was probably a poor choice for a single. Piano led, and with a string section provided by The Nashville String Machine, it’s not the type of song that historically has done well at country radio. However, Yearwood and MCA deserve some credit for thinking outside the box and sending an atypical choice to radio.
Travel is a recurring theme throughout this album — by car, as seen in “You Can Sleep While I Drive”, by bus as seen in “On A Bus To St. Cloud”, and by train on “O Mexico”, which would have been one of my choices for a single release. The production is understated, and Trisha resists falling into the trap of oversinging. One can easily imagine this song being performed more loudly and bombastically by, say, Faith Hill or Martina McBride, but Yearwood’s subtle interpretation is extremely effective in conveying the protagonist’s sense of loneliness and solitude to the listener.
On several occasions, The Song Remembers When came dangerously close to adult contemporary territory. The production on Thinkin’ About You is just as glossy, but it finds Trisha more firmly in the country camp. This is most evident on the tracks “The Restless Kind”, which is my favorite on the album, and the album closer, a tasteful cover of the Tammy Wynette classic “Till I Get It Right”, which resurfaced a few years later when it was included on a tribute album following Wynette’s death. It was one of a few standouts on that somewhat disappointing collection, and it is the perfect note on which to end Thinkin’ About You.
Though its singles performed inconsistently at radio, Thinkin’ About You did well at retail, reaching #3 on Billboard’s Top Country Albums chart, and earning platinum certification for sales in excess of one million units. It is still widely available from retailers such as Amazon and iTunes.
Grade: A-
My Kind of Country 